The most powerful experiences in sport are when you find common ground with someone from another world. These insights enable a much deeper, richer understanding of your own craft.

One of the best examples I can think of features our guest this week, Dr. Nicholas Romanov, the developer of the Pose Method of running. He was participating in a little back and forth Crossfit Journal interview with Greg Glassman and Louie Simmons of Westside Barbell fame.

Without a doubt, the entire series is worth a watch. Knowledge bombs abounds, friends. It’s refreshing to see such disparate figures agree on so much, especially when it comes to training. One of the more relevant points for most athletes and coaches is speed, or as Louie would call it, “Perfect speed.”

Dr. Romanov’s take was that strength work was not enough on its own, not for the athlete. If you were a high jumper, for example, grinding away to increase the squat wouldn’t necessarily help you jump higher, not unless there was a concurrent effort to improve your rate of force development.

Strength on its own won’t do you any good. You need it right on time, as close to instantaneous as you can get. That’s when you perform at your best. You need to develop your maximal AND explosive strength. It’s not enough to just complete the reps on your work sets. Regardless of whether the load is heavy or fairly light, move that barbell as quickly as you can possibly manage. This will keep your nervous system fine tuned and ready for maximal effort all year round. You’ll make the most out of your training.

What was Louie’s idea of perfect speed? Well, when you lift you must try to get from the start to lockout as quickly as possible. Until the rep becomes instantaneous you have to keep fighting for more speed. Always faster, faster, if you work at this you too can become incredibly strong. You can jump higher, and run better.